


Leave Those Umbrellas at Home

by Anonymous



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Case Fic, Comment Fic, Community: sherlockbbc_fic, Gen, Humor, Plotty, Surreal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-01-23
Updated: 2011-08-02
Packaged: 2017-10-15 01:01:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/155374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One London night at just about half past ten, for the first time in history, it started raining men. One of these men called himself Sherlock Holmes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. It's Raining Men

**Author's Note:**

> I was inspired by [this prompt](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/5950.html?thread=24041022#t24041022) on the Sherlock fic meme because I love the song, and somehow the fill refused to be crack. Caveat lector: this fic will be updated on a highly irregular basis - but I do have the entire story plotted, and I plan to finish it. Eventually.

John had a late shift at the hospital that night, so he only watched the TV in the waiting room out of the corner of his eye as he left to go home. The weather forecaster beamed enthusiastically at him through the screen. "Tonight, at just about half past ten, for the first time in history it's going to start raining men!" John took hold of his cane and shook his head a little. Last week they'd said it would be thundering wolves, but the lightning storm had brought nothing with it but half a hundred miniature poodles. John had one patient who got a concussion when one of the poodles landed on her head, but there were no other injuries reported. Another false alarm, probably.

On the streets near St. Bart's there gathered knots of young women in tight clothes, looking up at the sky and giggling to each other. John recognized a few nurses, as well as Molly Hooper from the morgue. What did the girls think was going to happen? Even if it really was about to start raining men, what would a man from the sky even be like? John's mate, Bill Murray, had adopted one of the miniature poodles from last week, and he said that while it was friendly enough, it never barked or begged for food; it frightened him a little.

The clouds overhead rumbled, as if with oncoming thunder, and some of the girls on the street shrieked. Many of them lost their nerve and took cover inside the shops. John stopped in the middle of the pavement despite himself and squinted upward. There was something coming down, that was for certain, though he couldn't quite make it out.

"Get ready, all you lonely girls!" someone shouted out the window of a car. A sense of foreboding settled over John like an old cloak, disturbingly familiar. If the things falling from the sky were really men, what would happen if they landed in a busy intersection?

John looked up again, and his mouth went dry. They were men. Falling face-up, naked, without so much as a whimper of fear.

And one of them was falling straight toward him.

John settled into a crouch to brace himself and held out his arms. The impact of the falling man was still strong enough to nearly topple him. He barely registered screams of awe and alarm all around. The man was tall, much taller than John, all lean limbs and long torso. He was slender, but much heavier than he looked, and John was forced to set him down as gently as possible on the pavement. It was only then that he realized that his cane lay discarded on the kerb. He dismissed this miracle as relatively small in the scale of things at the moment, and knelt to tend to the fallen man.

John pressed his fingers lightly to the man's pale neck. His thundercloud-grey eyes were open and focused, but he said nothing. "Are you all right?" asked John. The pulse was normal, which was strange in itself. If John had just fallen from the sky, he knew his pulse would be racing.

The man blinked. "Fine." His pale limbs stirred. "It's very warm, but not intolerable."

John stared at the man. It was 5 degrees out, and the man was naked. A distant voice in his brain suggested that if you were used to being up in the clouds, 5 degrees would seem positively tropical.

"What is the significance of the coverings on your body?" the man asked, eyeing John's clothing with a hint of disdain.

"It's clothing," said John. His lips felt numb as he spoke. It was finally starting to sink in that he was _talking to a man from the sky_. "Keeps me warm. We, uh, surface people tend to wear them almost all the time."

"Surface people." The man narrowed his eyes, ever so slightly. "You wear coverings to keep warm in this heat, you cover the planet in metal and cement, and seal yourselves into boxes for most of your lives."

"Yes," said John, feeling a little uncomfortable, "but we also - "

"Do surface people commit crimes?" demanded the naked man.

"Well, yes, we also do that, but - "

The man's eyes sparkled. "Good."

"Good?" John said, incredulously.

The man sprang to his feet. "Of course it's good, I can finally do something interesting. I suspected the surface would be less dull than Above. Where do I go if I want to solve crimes?"

"Scotland Yard, I suppose." The man from the sky moved as if to start walking. "But hang on, you can't just walk into Scotland Yard stark naked and ask them if they've got any crimes you can solve."

The man stopped and fixed John with his uncanny gaze. "Ah. So the body coverings aren't purely for warmth. I don't need them to be comfortable in this temperature, and yet it isn't socially acceptable for me to move about without them. Is there a ritual significance?" He narrowed his eyes. "No, you don't seem to view clothing as sacred. Taboo, most likely."

John blinked. He felt as if his brain were being flattened in slow motion by an oncoming train. There was something important he should be thinking about, but this man had him so flabbergasted he couldn't string two ideas together. Then he remembered - injuries. With men falling from the sky, no matter how strange they were, some of them were bound to be hurt. He looked around quickly, assessing the scene. Traffic had stopped entirely, so no chance of automotive collision. Two of the nurses were seeing to another man's head injury, while on the other side of the street another man leaned against a tall woman in a minidress, looking a little dazed but unhurt. Relieved, John returned his attention to the man he'd caught.

"Do you have names, up in the sky?" he asked.

"Sherlock," was the man's reply. His attention seemed to be elsewhere, though John couldn't even begin to guess where.

"Why don't I take you to the hospital, and I'll find you some scrubs. You won't be able to walk far without, ah, body coverings." Already John was starting to notice some of the girls on the street eyeing Sherlock with awe and more than a little speculation.

"Hospital?"

"Hospital. It's a place where people go when they get hurt. I work there and help people get better. You can get dressed there."

"Fine."

John picked up his cane and led the way back to the hospital. He hadn't needed it a few moments before, but the weight of it was reassuring in his hand. They got not a few stares on the way, and news vans were starting to close in. John picked up the pace, not wanting Sherlock to get cornered by reporters. Sherlock wasn't ready for them; come to think of it, he might never be. He kept looking around at the buildings as if he couldn't believe that any sane person would lock themselves up inside one. He stooped to pick up a coin and studied it, then tried to put it in his mouth.

"What are you doing?!" John cried. "Take that out of your mouth, you'll choke!"

Sherlock spat the coin out onto his palm. It shone with saliva. "It tastes like blood."

"That's because it's metal. There's iron in your blood."

"What is it for?"

"It's for exchange. It symbolizes a certain value, and you can exchange it for something of the same value."

Sherlock kept the coin tucked in his hand and followed John the rest of the way to the hospital. Sometimes he could feel the strange man's scrutiny on him, crawling over his skin like a living thing all its own. John couldn't help but wonder what Sherlock thought of him. How did he compare to people from the sky? Sherlock didn't seem to like life in the clouds much. Maybe that was why things seemed to rain down from there so often these days.

The receptionist at the front desk in the hospital was Candice, a girl John knew from his night shifts. "John, are you all right?" she began. "I've heard there were - " Her eyes widened at the sight of Sherlock, but she kept her calm, as anyone who works in a hospital ought. "Another raining man?" she said.

John nodded. "Got any scrubs in his size?"

Candice studied Sherlock and nodded. "Should do, yeah. Give me a mo'." She gestured for another woman to take her post while she fetched the scrubs.

Sherlock was looking at the ceiling like he'd never seen one before - which he probably hadn't. "You block out the sky and replace it with artificial lighting. Why...? Of course. You're below the clouds, you're exposed to all kinds of things from Above. You've got to protect yourselves."

"We don't like getting caught in the rain very much, no. Especially when the rain isn't water."

"You didn't object to catching me when I fell."

"Of course I didn't! If I hadn't caught you, you'd be splattered all over the pavement."

"I wouldn't be. I wasn't at terminal velocity, you must have noticed that. Otherwise I'd've knocked you flat."

Candice returned with the scrubs and laid them on the front desk. "Here you are. You can get changed in the toilet down the hall. Or you could do it here, I suppose, since you're already..." She cleared her throat and didn't finish.

Sherlock held up the scrubs in front of him as if they were a long-dead sea creature.

"John," he said. "How do I put these on?"

* * *

"I can't just take you to Scotland Yard," John explained, for what felt like the twentieth time. "They've got people there who've been trained to solve crimes. They've been doing it for years. They're not going to let anyone who shows up have a chance at helping them."

"I don't need training," Sherlock insisted. "My powers of observation and deductive reasoning are sufficient. Surface people are terribly unobservant."

John ought to have brought this man in for psychiatric observation. He really ought to. But he saved Sherlock's life, and that meant he was responsible for him. He had to look after him, like he looked after the men in his unit in Afghanistan. That meant keeping him from wandering into New Scotland Yard like a lost and very determined puppy.

"We've got procedures down here, Sherlock. Systems you can't possibly - you don't even have ID! They won't let you through the door!"

Sherlock unfurled across the park bench where he'd installed himself, one arm draped across the back of the bench, the other trailing into the dried and brittle grass. "Procedures. Systems." He let out a sigh, and a look of distaste settled over his face. "I suppose there's nothing else to be done. I'll have to call Mycroft."

"Mycroft? Who's Mycroft?" John assumed it had to be a cloud person, since Sherlock didn't know any surface people besides him.

"My brother," Sherlock sighed, "and also my… the nearest word would be creditor. All anyone talks about is debt, up Above. Always keeping track of who owes what to whom - it's all very tedious." He waved a hand dismissively. "Mycroft insists on harping on my debts to him constantly."

A heavy fog began to settle across the park where Sherlock and John were sitting, filling the air with dimness and damp. Sherlock clapped a hand to his forehead and groaned. "Here he comes."

John looked up. The fog formed a sort of bridge between the clouds and the earth. As he watched, the upper strata of the fog began to stir, like the steam above a fresh cup of tea. The disturbance lowered until it was about 10 meters above the ground, then grew nearer. John could just make out a shape through the fog - a human shape. A bit of fog peeled away, and a man's head came into view. It was haughty, smiling, with dark slicked-back hair. The rest of his body was obscured and could only be seen in silhouette, for which John was grateful, given the cloud people's apparent distaste for clothing.

"Greetings, Sherlock," said the man, his voice oily and sweet. "How are you adjusting to surface life?"

"Fine," Sherlock bit out. "I've been here less than a quarter of an Earth's turn and it's already been more interesting than a whole circling up Above."

"Good," the man said. Something that looked strangely like an umbrella lashed back and forth at his side. "I shan't tell Mummy, though. I wouldn't want her to think that the exile turned out to be anything but a punishment."

Sherlock curled in on himself on the park bench, drawing his knees up to his chin. "I need a favor, Mycroft," he mumbled.

"Another favor?" Mycroft's eyes widened. "Your debts to me are becoming substantial."

"I know," Sherlock growled. "I'll repay them. I swore it by oath, remember?"

"Very well. What is your request?"

"I want to solve crimes, but John says - " Sherlock looked at him sidelong - "that the surface people won't let me. There are certain procedures."

"Ah, yes. Procedures." Mycroft turned the thing that looked like an umbrella around so that its tip was just beneath his chin. He looked down at it and twirled it between his hands. "Go to Scotland Yard and tell them their new consulting detective has arrived, and that you would like to speak to Detective Inspector Lestrade." He looked up from the umbrella-thing. "Make sure Dr. Watson buys you some clothing first."

"What will I owe you for this?" asked Sherlock through gritted teeth.

Mycroft smiled in a way that made John want to run away and never look back. "The usual, I think."

"Fine. Now go away. And don't watch me from up there." Sherlock turned so that he faced the back of the park bench.

"Of course not," Mycroft agreed, in a way that made it obvious that he would continue to spy on Sherlock from the clouds in perpetuity. The fog stirred, covering Mycroft's face, and it rippled upward as the man returned to his home in the clouds.

John frowned. "He called me Dr. Watson."

"Yes?" said Sherlock, his voice muffled from being pressed against the park bench.

"You never told him my full name."

"It's his business to know such things," Sherlock said, disgustedly. "What I don't understand is why he wanted you to acquire more clothing." He plucked at the sleeve of his scrubs. "This is perfectly adequate in satisfying your ridiculous nudity taboo."

John shook his head and suppressed a fond smile. "Your brother's right, Sherlock. You can't go to Scotland Yard in those clothes. I'll need to get you properly dressed." He looked up at the clouds. "If he's so omniscient, he could have at least left some money to go clothes shopping."

* * *

Sherlock spent the rest of the night in John's tiny flat, doing… well, John didn't know what. The suggestion of sleeping on the sofa earned him only a blank stare. "You can do whatever you want 'round the flat. It's not much, but I suppose it's all brand new to you, so you might find it interesting."

For his part, John slept without dreaming until dawn. After dressing and getting washed, John found Sherlock leaning halfway out the open window, watching the morning traffic. The entire flat was chilly with the first winds of winter. "Surface people pollute our sky with smoke and carbon dioxide, all so they can have this," said Sherlock, his voice raised over the sounds of wind and traffic. "Is it worth it?"

"Probably not," John admitted. "Can you close the window? I'm freezing."

Sherlock leaned back and shut the window, and the smell and sound of cars abruptly cut out.

John went to the kitchen and heated up some toast. "Would you like some breakfast? I don't know what you eat up there, but I've got toast and jam."

Another blank stare. John took a bite out of a piece of toast as a demonstration. "Toast. Breakfast. Eating."

Sherlock watched intently as John ate the toast. "You cannibalize organic molecules from other organisms and incorporate them into your bodies."

John dropped his toast on the counter. "Are you saying you don't do that?"

"Of course not, John. It's hardly an effective energy conversion. There must be losses of least 80% of the chemical energy in that so-called breakfast of yours. Direct conversion of sunlight into chemical energy is far more efficient."

"You… photosynthesize, then."

"Is there a problem?"

"No. It's fine. It's all fine." And it was. But if he caught Sherlock looking faint, he'd either force some food into him or send him to the park to sunbathe - John wasn't sure which.

Sherlock watched with unnerving intensity as John ate his breakfast, with a combination of fascination and disbelief. When John spread some jam on his toast, Sherlock dipped his finger in the jam and held it to his nose. He made a neutral hmm-ing noise, then put the finger in his mouth. The contortions his face went through in response made John almost choke as he held in laughter.

"Photosynthesized by a low-lying plant, shaped into a reproductive organ meant to entice pollinators, picked, industrially processed within an inch of its life, then drenched in simple carbohydrates," Sherlock said, with the tone of someone discussing ancient embalming practices.

"That's pretty much the shape of it, yeah," said John.

"Do not presume to offer me 'breakfast' again."

"Got it."

* * *

John didn't have the means to pay a cab fare, so he took Sherlock on a bus to Marks and Spencer. At first he seemed disconcerted by the idea of being sealed in a tiny, moving box that belched noxious gases into the atmosphere, but soon enough he had his nose pressed to the window, his glacial blue eyes absorbing the sights of London as they passed. Sometimes, John would point out specific things to him - "that thing the girl's riding is called a bicycle, they're good exercise" - and Sherlock would ask questions, his focus never wavering from the window. Halfway through the trip, John realized he'd left his cane at home. He supposed it didn't matter anymore.

John explained to Sherlock that Marks and Spencer was a place of exchange, where symbols of value could be swapped for physical goods. He understood this without further clarification, though the perfume counter made him question the sanity of surface people as a species.

John had hardly any money to spare for clothing, so he picked out three sets of boxers, three pairs of socks, three T-shirts, white trainers, and a pair of jeans. Sherlock expressed no preference as to color or fit, so John went for the cheapest items in the department store and sent Sherlock to the fitting room with them. After half a minute, he heard Sherlock call out, "John, I need help!"

The store clerk noticed John tracking Sherlock's voice and smiled. "You can go ahead and join your boyfriend in the fitting room. I don't mind."

"He's not my boyfriend," John groused. _No, he's not my boyfriend at all,_ he thought. _I just caught him in my manly arms when he fell out of the sky._ He went to the fitting room, knocked, and Sherlock let him in.

He had his boxers on inside out, and was struggling with the zip on his jeans, trying to fasten the teeth together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. "These metal fastenings are a design flaw," he complained. "If you're going to insist that everyone wear clothing at all times, you ought to make it easier to put on."

John rubbed his eyebrow with his thumb. He hadn't had to help someone else get dressed since his teens, when he helped babysit his neighbors' children. "That's not how it works," he said, and zipped Sherlock's flies for him.

"Ah," said Sherlock, without a hint of self-consciousness. "And this?" He plucked at the button on his jeans.

John fastened that for him too, then stepped back to assess the fit. "They'll be fine on you. Now try on the T-shirts."

Sherlock managed the T-shirts without any help. They were tighter on him than John would have chosen for himself, but he doubted any of the women at Scotland Yard - or the blokes, for that matter - would mind. John opened the fitting room door and asked the clerk, "Can my friend wear them out? He hasn't got much else."

The clerk raised her eyebrows, but nodded. "As long as they can scan the tags at the register..."

"Good." John steered Sherlock out of the fitting room area. "Come on. We're going to find you a jacket."

"A jacket? Is that the covering you wear over your shirt?" Sherlock wrinkled his nose a little. "You can't make me wear one. I'll overheat."

"You don't have to wear it indoors. Only when you're out. People will think you're mad if you walk around in 5 degrees without a jacket."

In the outerwear section of the department store, Sherlock was immediately drawn to a calf-length dark tweed jacket that looked like something the hero of a film noir might wear, demonstrating his first clothing preference thus far. John read the price tag and blanched. It must have been the most expensive item in the entire store.

"I can't buy that, Sherlock. Remember what I told you about coins and what they mean? I don't have enough coins for this jacket."

"We'll just have to owe this store a debt, then."

"Look. I don't know how you settle debts up… Above, but down here we pay them back in coins. Money. It'd take me years to earn enough money to pay down the debt from that coat."

"You use those coins to settle debts?" Sherlock spoke as if John were suggesting buying costume jewelry for his wife for their tenth wedding anniversary.

"Yes, we do. Now put the coat back on the rack, Sherlock."

He complied, and let John pick out a much cheaper dark fleece. The total bill only made him cringe a little - after all, it was for a good cause, wasn't it?

* * *

Sherlock somehow cut an imposing figure as he strode into New Scotland Yard, even though he was dressed in cheap, casual clothing and his hair looked like it hadn't seen a comb in, well, ever. "Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective," he told the young woman at the front desk, imperiously. "And this is Dr. John Watson, my, ah..." He gestured toward John.

"Colleague," John supplied. "We're here to see Detective Inspector Lestrade."

The young woman tapped at her keyboard. Sherlock peered at the computer as if the sheer force of his stare could penetrate the layers of plastic and circuitry. "Ah, yes, there we are," she said. "Sherlock Holmes for DI Lestrade, 10:30 am." She gave them directions to Lestrade's office and waved them through.

"She didn't even ask for ID," said John, marveling.

"Mycroft's doing, no doubt."

"How does Mycroft know so much about surface people?"

"He occupies the lower levels. Stratus clouds and the like. Closer to the ground. I've always been a cumulonimbus man, myself."

John didn't even pretend to know what Sherlock was talking about. Instead he glanced at the TV monitor they passed. A reporter was saying, "In interviews with reporters, the so-called 'Raining Men' cite a figure of exactly 279 men fallen from the sky last night. So far, only 185 'Raining Men' have been accounted for." John thought he saw Sherlock briefly give the TV a calculating glance.

When they reached DI Lestrade's office, John reached out and knocked on the door before Sherlock could do anything strange enough to give himself away as a Raining Man. He didn't think Sherlock would be able to appropriately handle one reporter, let alone a whole screaming flock of them. Sherlock was going to come across as odd - there was nothing John could do to prevent that - but hopefully everyone would assume he'd lived his entire life on terra firma.

"Come in," said a voice from the within the voice. John opened the door. Lestrade was a silver-haired man with rumpled clothing and a weary expression, which brightened at the sight of them. "You're the consulting detective and his colleague?"

"Yes," said Sherlock. John relaxed a little at the self-assurance in his voice.

"Thank God," said Lestrade, rubbing at his temples. "We're severely understaffed here. Seems like half the Met's running to answer calls about people finding Raining Men in their skips."

John very deliberately didn't look at Sherlock.

"We could do with your help on a case," Lestrade continued, passing Sherlock a file folder. "Woman found dead early this morning. Helen Schofield, 29-year-old RSPCA employee from Wimborne visiting her sister Clarice in London. Her sister came home after a night on the town and found Helen's body covered in bite marks, and her pet Rottweiler with blood on his teeth. Seems like a straightforward animal attack, but we have reason to believe it may have been homicide."

Sherlock raised his eyebrows, prompting Lestrade to continue.

"She'd been receiving death threats for weeks. Unlikely that an experienced animal handler should be fatally attacked by her own dog just when a lot of people happen to want her dead."

"Did the threats state why they wanted her dead?"

"Last month, it rained Rottweilers in Wimborne. Helen Schofield was leading an effort to find homes for them. There's a lot of people in Britain who think any living thing that falls from the sky is dangerous and ought to be put down on the spot."

John could feel himself sweating under his jumper. If there were people who thought dogs from the clouds were dangerous, that had to apply doubly so to people. He'd known Sherlock for less than 24 hours, but already he felt responsible for him. Like it would be his fault if anything bad happened to him.

"Shall we go and see the body, then?"

"Go ahead, Mr. Holmes," Lestrade said.

Sherlock rose to go, and when John caught his eyes, they were alight with a fever that was something far too much like joy.


	2. God Bless Mother Nature

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, that was a really long delay! But I promised I'd deliver more, and so I have. Thanks to [Yamx](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Yamx/pseuds/Yamx) for the fine beta read.

On the way to St. Bart's with Lestrade, John realized something important.

"When we get to St. Bart's, tell Lestrade you have to visit the loo," he whispered to Sherlock.

"The loo?"

"The room in my flat with all the white ceramics and running water. That's the loo. I need to get to the morgue before you do. The technician in the morgue – Molly Hooper – I think she saw me catch you last night. I don't want her telling anyone."

To John's relief, Sherlock nodded without demanding any further clarification. It seemed he didn't want to be widely known as a Raining Man either – though John suspected Sherlock's reasons might be different from his own. John relaxed in his seat, but his mind still churned. There was so much more he needed to know, not just to satisfy his curiosity, but to keep Sherlock – and a lot of other people besides – safe.

Sherlock glanced at him sidelong. "You have questions. Ask."

The first question that came to John's mind was: "Why aren't there any Raining Women?" He kept his voice pitched low.

"They can't afford to exile women," said Sherlock, his voice hushed to match John's. “Radiation exposure increases with altitude in the atmosphere, with predictable effects on fertility. The problem is more acute in women, as they can't manufacture new gametes throughout the life cycle. Our population growth rate barely manages replacement levels as it is.”

"Why were you exiled?" John asked, more quietly.

"Cloud people aren't like surface people." Sherlock's face went carefully blank; John couldn't figure out what he was trying to mask. "We can do things surface people can't, but we pay a price. We can be controlled more easily than we realize. The way we see the world, our perceptions, are all subject to manipulation. They are able to suppress free will, to a certain extent."

"They? Who's 'they'?"

"Your language is inadequate," said Sherlock, his frustration so palpable it hung over him like a storm. "There isn't a word. _They_ are at the levers of power over the collective will. They decide by consensus. And they decided, a long time ago, to suppress the will to commit crime."

"Isn't that a good thing? A whole society without crime?"

"It's _wrong_. Cloud people are still people, John. Animals cheat and deceive all the time, from insects to chimpanzees. Humans are no exception. Crime is as much a part of us as music or art or technology. I said as much, loudly and publicly. That's how the trouble started."

" _They_ didn't like it, did they?"

"No. It was all Mycroft could do to prevent radical mental intervention on all the free will supporters. He managed to get us exiled instead."

"Blimey." John hadn't realized he was harboring some kind of political fugitive.

"It probably isn't safe, you know. Having me around."

"I'm starting to see that, yeah." John thought of Afghanistan, and how composed he always felt inside when he was under fire. "I've never been very good at safe."

Sherlock smiled, just a little. "Neither have I."

The police car pulled into the parking lot of St. Bart's. They followed Lestrade in, and Sherlock managed to ask about the loo without sounding like he'd never heard of one until five minutes before. John wondered what Sherlock would do in there. It wasn't as if a photosynthetic person would need to use it.

John went into the morgue, feigning nonchalance. Lestrade waited just outside for Sherlock and didn't follow. He looked for Molly Hooper, nerves taut. He barely knew her - maybe she wouldn't recognize him. _Maybe not me,_ he corrected himself, _but there's no way she could miss Sherlock. Even if he hadn't fallen from the sky before her eyes, he's more than a bit striking._

Molly put down the clipboard she'd been using to take notes. "Oh! Hello, Dr. Watson." Then her eyes widened and she dropped her biro. "You caught a Raining Man last night!"

"Not so loud!" John hissed, looking back over his shoulder to check on Lestrade. He hadn't moved or shown any indication of alarm. "He's here. With me. He's a detective helping DI Lestrade on a case, and as far as Lestrade knows that's _all_ he is."

"You're not telling the police about him?" She looked pale and a bit frightened at the idea.

"No, I'm not, and neither can you. What if they lock him up? He's lived all his life in the sky. He won't be able to handle jail. He's best left alone, and if it gets about that he's a Raining Man he'll never get any peace."

"You've known him for only half a day. How do you know what's best for him?"

"He doesn't know what's best for himself. He's like a child. Everything on the surface is new for him."

"If he doesn't know anything about life down here, how did he get to be a detective?"

John sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Let's just say he's got connections. Look, Molly, you don't have to agree with me on everything. But you've got to agree that the kind of publicity the Raining Men are getting could wear on anyone's nerves, especially someone who's just gone through a traumatic experience."

Molly opened her mouth to say something more, but John heard Lestrade's footsteps coming toward them and silenced her with a gesture. "Morning, Molly," said Lestrade. "We're here to see Helen Schofield, if it's not too much trouble."

Sherlock came into the morgue a few strides behind Lestrade. He wrinkled his nose, and at first John couldn't think why; then he realized that to someone unaccustomed to hospitals, the chemical smell of the mortuary could be overwhelming. Molly watched him for a moment, wide-eyed, but said nothing. John gave her a look that he hoped would communicate his gratitude.

"No trouble," Molly told Lestrade, smiling shyly at him. It probably wasn't often that people were polite to her. "She's all prepped in the examining room."

John wasn't squeamish - never had been, even when he was little and Harry shoved her scabs and scratches in his face in a misguided attempt to make him lose his appetite. Still, John had never felt at home with bloodless corpses on their metal tables. When he was on the battlefield, bloodied to the elbows in a fellow soldier's entrails and adrenaline roaring in his ears, or when he was seeing to a patient at the hospital, kindness in his face and his words, a body in any state of injury was something to be knit together, made whole. It was his life's dedication to make that happen. He'd dissected more corpses than he could count in medical school, but he was most in his element with a living body, one that he could mend.

The body had the opposite effect on Sherlock Holmes.

He came alive in a way John had never seen before. Sherlock never quite seemed real, like there was something behind his eyes that ran on clockwork or faerie dust. In the face of death, Sherlock was suddenly flesh and blood, life radiating through his translucent skin. His fingers flew over the body that was once Helen Schofield, his gaze taking her apart as efficiently as John might have done with a scalpel. Then he took a step back from the corpse and went still, and he could have been a wind-up doll or a golem once more.

"Well?" said Lestrade, expectant.

Sherlock looked at John. "What do you see?"

"Pardon?"

Sherlock gestured at the body. "Have a look. I want to know what you see."

"I can't do what you do," said John. "I'm not - "

"You work at the hospital. You help people who are hurt. You know what to look for."

Sherlock's trust in him struck John as almost childlike. He worked at a hospital, so of course he would know what to do. For Sherlock, it was as simple as that. "All right," John said. "I'll have a look."

The body was horribly mangled with claw and tooth marks, to the point that the woman beneath was barely distinguishable. She was plump and blonde and chewed her nails - that was all he could tell. John had treated patients attacked by dogs in Afghanistan, though never an attack even close to fatal. "A big dog, Rottweiler or Doberman-sized judging by the bite marks," he said, inspecting the tooth marks at the juncture of shoulder and neck. "This is probably the bite that killed her. Punctured the jugular." He walked a circuit of the body. "The dog probably knocked her to the ground first. Some of her bones seem to be broken from the impact when it tackled her. I'd say we ought to check the dog for signs of rabies. We haven't got rabies in the UK anymore, but I suppose we can't say as much for dogs from the sky."

"The dog isn't rabid,” said Sherlock dismissively. “That's exactly what the killer wants you to think. Very well staged, but the bite marks give it away.”

“Are you saying someone set the dog on her?” asked John.

“Look at these bite wounds, John,” said Sherlock. “Are you familiar with the dentition of the domestic canine?”

“No,” said John, but he followed Sherlock's pointed finger to one of the bite marks.

“Dogs have 42 teeth. This bite is from the upper jaw. Six incisors, two upper canines.”

“So?”

“Cloud dogs have four incisors and four upper canines. These bite marks are not from Helen's dog.” Sherlock gave Lestrade a pointed look. “But someone wants the police to believe they are.”

“But why?” Lestrade demanded.

“Isn't it obvious? Humans are small-minded, frightened of change. Anything new is a threat. There's a movement afoot to eradicate all forms of cloud-based life. If it gets about that a cloud dog turned on its owner, it gives their movement ammunition.”

“But how did you know?” asked Lestrade. “About the teeth?”

“I'm a consulting detective. It's my business to know about causes of death. Some people die from animal attacks. I do research. Check the dentition against that of Helen's dog. Surely even a pack of incompetents can manage it.”

He looked at Molly expectantly, and she stammered out, "Uh, yes, of course, I can – "

“And I want tissue samples from the bite wounds. I'll be back later to have a look at them.”

“Well, I suppose, just – "

"Good. Come along, John."

John would have protested how Sherlock was treating the people around him like trained circus animals, but he told himself that perhaps etiquette worked differently Above than on the surface, and followed without comment. They waited in the police car for Lestrade, the silence taut between them. John's leg began to throb again, just a little. "Why did I leave my cane at home?" he muttered to himself. "I've gone mad."

"Cane?" said Sherlock.

"Yes. I had it with me yesterday, when I caught you. I use it - or, well, I used it - to help me walk when my leg was acting up. Except I think my therapist might have been right about it being psychosomatic."

"Psychosomatic injury. You also have limited mobility in your left shoulder. You don't talk about how you acquired these ailments, but they've been well-treated, for the most part. They come from a traumatic event, but not one so shameful that you failed to seek treatment. How did you come by them?"

John sighed and leaned back against the seat of the police car. "There's a war on in Afghanistan, down on the surface. Dry, hot place, lots of mountains. Have you heard of it?"

Sherlock surprised him by saying, "Yes."

"How?"

"Clouds travel, John. I've seen the place you call Afghanistan. I've seen the fiery weapons you drop from your flying machines. Surface people have come up with remarkably unpleasant and efficient ways to kill one another."

"Don't you have wars, up there?"

"No. They wouldn't allow it. Too much chaos."

"You're better people than we are, then."

"Is that what you think?" Sherlock snorted. "Cloud people aren't morally superior. If we were, we'd do something to stop your wars. Instead we sit up there and watch. Some people Above view it as a kind of spectator sport."

"Do you?"

"Hardly. Wars are obvious. They're all about power and settling debts. Murder is interesting. The motives are far more complex."

John didn't know what to say to that. He wondered if Sherlock saw Helen Schofield as a real person, not just a body. Were surface people truly people to him? But they must be. Sherlock treated John like a fellow person. The real question was whether surface people would accept the Raining Men.

"You do realize you're in danger, Sherlock," John said. "If word gets out about this, people won't listen to reason. They'll start saying that anything that falls from the sky is dangerous."

"Mycroft's paperwork will shield me. Or it ought to, anyway, I'll be paying enough for it."

"If you don't pay your debts using money," said John, slowly, "then how exactly are you - "

Just then, Lestrade opened the door of the police car and got into the driver's seat. "Clarice Schofield lives in West Ealing, so sit back. It'll take a while with this traffic."

Sherlock's face was practically glued to the window as usual, though John didn't dare point out anything too obvious in case Lestrade started to wonder. Instead, he took note of innocuous things: "There's a poster for that new film with Jeff Bridges in it. Good actor." He didn't know if what he said made any sense to Sherlock – did they have movies up in the clouds? – but he seemed interested in what John had to say. One thing was for certain: he never looked up at the sky.

* * *

Clarice Schofield's flat was modest, and had probably once been clean. Now the place reeked of death, and bright stripes of crime scene tape screamed against the muted color scheme. Sherlock paid no attention to the forensics team and started inspecting the door and its frame.

"What's this bloke doing here?" demanded a forensics specialist. "He's not wearing gloves - he'll contaminate my crime scene!"

"Anderson, this is Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective. He's here to help us on this case."

"There is no case. This woman was attacked by her dog, which was probably infected with some disease it got who knows where in the atmosphere - "

"I suppose you're an expert on canine diseases, then," Sherlock sneered, still looking at the doorknob and not at Anderson.

"Have either of you left primary school?" said Lestrade, throwing his hands up in the air. "Mr. Holmes is here to assist this investigation, Anderson. Holmes, you're to treat employees of the Met with the respect they're due."

"No sign of a break-in," said Sherlock, showing no indication that he'd heard Lestrade except to treat Anderson as if he were a particularly uninteresting bit of furniture. "Not through the door, in any case."

John followed Sherlock into the flat, giving the pool of blood and other fluids in the kitchen a wide berth. Sherlock, though, strode right in and knelt beside the food and water bowls for the dog. He sniffed at the crumbs of food in one of the bowls. “Helen did her research,” he murmured. “Correct balance of nutrients to sustain life in a cloud dog, or near enough. Though it would be far more efficient in liquid form. Drinking meets all their dietary needs.”

He inspected all the windows in the flat for signs of a break-in. John thought it was a bit mad, himself, since the flat was on the tenth story, but he supposed the value of having Sherlock on the case was that he thought outside the box. Far, far outside the box. In fact, he might not even know what a box was.

Next, Sherlock went through Helen's suitcase, which contained only clothes, toiletries, a paperback romance novel, and more dog food. Sherlock's eyebrows rose when he read the blurb on the back of the romance novel. “People read this nonsense?” Implied in the question, at least to John's ears, was _Surface people read this nonsense?_

John looked around to make sure no one was within earshot, then said, “Some do, yeah. But not all books are like that. I'll lend you a few good ones sometime.”

Sherlock returned the book to the suitcase and inspected the dog's food bowl. “I'm taking this for chemical analysis,” he announced to the flat at large.

“That's evidence!” said Anderson. “Lestrade, he can't just barge in here and take evidence.”

“You'll have to fill out the paperwork at Scotland Yard first, Mr. Holmes,” said Lestrade. “Just drop by afterward and the secretary will talk you through it.”

Sherlock arched an eyebrow at John. “I'll come with you if you like,” John offered. Paperwork was probably yet another task beyond Sherlock's powers.

“I didn't say I needed help,” Sherlock groused, but didn't turn down the offer. “What kind of equipment for chemical analysis do you have at home? Phenomenoscopes? Catalyzers? Heat sinks?”

“I don't have anything like that, Sherlock. You saw how small my flat is.”

“Problematic,” he murmured. “I'll have to use the facilities at St. Barts in the meantime.”

“In the meantime? Until what?”

“Until I find a solution.”

“Sherlock, you are not going to set up a lab in my flat.”

“Obviously not. The confines are a clear limitation. I'll find us a new flat.”

“You haven't got any money,” said John, pitching his voice low so only Sherlock could hear. “You don't even know how to go flat-searching. Do you even know to use the Internet?”

“Give me time,” said Sherlock. Then, to Lestrade, he said, “I need to speak to Clarice Schofield.”

“She's at the neighbor's right next door,” said Lestrade. “Still in shock. Come.” He consulted with the forensics team for a moment, waving them on to wait for him in the corridor.

“What are you thinking?” John asked Sherlock, quietly, as they made their way back out of the flat, with its reek of death and forensic chemicals.

“Nothing you'd understand,” said Sherlock dismissively. The case was clearly more interesting to him than John was.

“Simplify it, then. You're not just barging in to talk to Clarice. Tell me first, and I can employ a skill I learned in medical school called _bedside manner_.”

“The killer may have broken in and used facsimiles of a dog's jaws to kill her. Or perhaps not. But it's likely he had to break into the flat at some point to perpetrate the crime. No signs of forced entry. I need to know who else could have entered that home. I saw you open your door with a piece of jagged metal. That is how you bypass the access point.”

“A key. You want to know who has the key to her flat.”

“You call that piece of metal a key?” It was the same tone of voice Sherlock had used upon learning that surface people used pieces of metal and paper to pay back debt.

“Yeah, well, if you ask Clarice who's got a jagged piece of metal they can use to open her door, she'll think you're mad.” He added in a mutter, “And she wouldn't be wrong.”

Sherlock sniffed and paid him no further attention. Lestrade emerged from the flat, then, and knocked the door of the flat next door, which was slightly ajar. “Come in!” came a voice from within, high and reedy. Lestrade entered, and Sherlock swept in after him. Somehow he managed to give that distinct impression of sweeping in, despite his cheap clothes. How did he do that?

John hurried to keep up, dreading what terribly insensitive things Sherlock would say if John weren't there to keep him in check. Did he have any concept of the mourning process? He wasn't about to bet on it. He entered the flat, which he could tell immediately by smell and décor was occupied by an old woman. Everything in it was so chintzy he couldn't even form words for it in his mind.

He found a kitchen with a round table. The tablecloth was trimmed in a lace that by all laws of reality was too frilly to exist. The table legs had elaborations. He tried to focus on the people instead.

The owner of the flat was tiny, bespectacled, her hair long and silver. Her dress had a floral print with details on the leaves and petals so ornate they probably would have held up to inspection under a microscope. The floral print clashed with the one on the teacup she held. Beside her was a young woman with stringy bleach-blonde hair, a slender face, and blue eyes puffy with tears. Lestrade stood beside them, his face and manner gentle. Sherlock loomed on the other side of the table like a thundercloud. The contrast of his entire being against the flat was enough to nearly make John burst out in hysterical laughter.

Sherlock had been speaking as John entered, but he hadn't caught what was said. He did hear the reply, though.

“I've already talked to the detectives,” said Clarice to Sherlock, her eyes only briefly flicking toward John. “They took down statements and everything. Why've I got to talk to you too?”

“I suppose it won't be necessary,” Sherlock drawled, sounding bored. “Cut-and-dried case. That foul creature was bound to turn rabid on its owner sooner or later. Your sister was a fool to think she could keep it under control.”

Clarice flushed pink. “Don't you dare say that! Helen loved that dog!”

“It's not a dog. Anything that can fall from the sky and survive isn't a real animal at all.”

“She's a sweet dog. I don't know how it happened. Just leave me alone!”

Clarice's elderly neighbor reached out and squeezed her hand, giving Sherlock a stern glare through her spectacles. Lestrade was watching Sherlock intently, and looked poised to step in if he made too much of a cock-up of things, but said nothing yet.

The bored manner fell away from Sherlock like a cloak, and he leaned forward in his chair, eyes alight with interest. “So you're not prejudiced against cloud dogs. Interesting. Does anyone else have a key to your flat?”

Clarice paused mid-sob. “ _What?_ ”

John felt that this was the right time to step in. “I'm sorry, Ms. Schofield. My, ah, colleague doesn't mean to be rude. He's just trying to find out what happened to your sister.”

“Detective Donovan already asked her. Talk to her. You've upset Clarice enough already,” said the old lady.

“Please, ma'am,” said Lestrade. “Mr. Holmes is here to help.”

“Does anyone else have a key to your flat?”

Clarice seemed to answer before she'd quite decided if it was a good idea to speak to this madman. “The super's got a key. And my ex-boyfriend, I s'pose. We split a few months back, but I never changed the locks. He's not like that.”

“Enough,” said the old lady. “Out! If you have any more questions, call her once she's had some sleep.”

Sherlock rose from his seat, but asked Clarice, “His name?”

Clarice shot a look to Lestrade, who nodded encouragingly. “Daniel Phan.”

The old lady made shooing motions toward the door. Sherlock ignored her. “Did your sister live alone?”

Clarice flinched at Sherlock's use of the past tense, but nodded.

“One last question. Did you see the dog, before they took it away?”

She shook her head. “No. They said she was dangerous. Wouldn't let me anywhere near her.”

Finally, Sherlock turned to leave. John elbowed him, but of course he didn't take the hint, so on his behalf John said, “Thank you for your time. And I'm sorry.”

Sherlock swept out much as he had come in, murmuring, “I need to look at the tissue samples for traces of any material that may have been used as a facsimile jaw. I also want to analyze the food bowl for trace genetic material from the dog.”

“How do you know it's not just a cloud dog with funny teeth or something?”

“Cloud dogs have fewer incisors than surface dogs. Missing teeth are easily explained, extra teeth less so.” He paused in the corridor, his mind far away. “I need a place for experiments. Equipment. Your flat is inadequate.” He turned toward the stairs by which they'd come.

“Where are you going?”

“To find a new flat.”

“What about Clarice's ex-boyfriend? Aren't you going to talk to him?”

“I'm putting my best man on the job.”

“And who's that, then?”

Sherlock looked back over his shoulder at John, his eyes communicating more clearly than any words: _must I spell it out for you?_

“Oh,” said John.

What now?


End file.
